"A mirage, but the specific physical circumstances under which fata morgana should be applied to a particular sighting are ill-defined."

"The best that can be said is that the mirage interacts with features in the landscape to present a scene of sufficient ambiguity that viewers often arrive at quite fanciful interpretations.

"Cases reported include those of the apparent sighting of cities, mountains, forests, or islands (sometimes metamorphosing one into the other) in places where it was known that no such things existed."

This photo was taken by Cameron Mosier with his cell phone at the south end of Pere Marquette Beach in Muskegon.

"The for the record reaction was 'wow,' I can't believe how detailed it is," he said. "It didn't take any time for me to realize what it was because I've spent my childhood growing up in the neighborhood and have heard stories of it being visible."

Mosier said he saw a similar phenomenon the day before, only this time with dunes near Grand Haven.

"That was more of a shock for me," he said. "Having seen the lakeshore one way for 25 years and then seeing it look like the shores of sleeping bear dunes one day."